Macquarie Law School
People and Planet Units
LEX101
Law, Institutions and People - A Global Perspective
LEX101 can be taken to satisfy the requirement for completion of a People unit under Macquarie's Bachelor Degree rules, and it can also be taken generally as an elective to complement your specific choice of units in your degree program.
No prerequisite knowledge of the law is required to do this unit, and there is an emphasis on analysis of issues from pluralistic perspectives and a constant discourse between students from widely varying academic disciplines.
In this unit we take a comparative look at domestic and global legal systems, and question whether the law can effectively regulate diverse social, political and technological issues. At the heart of our conversation is the nature and achievability of democracy, the rights and obligations of the individual in their community, and the challenge of regulating diverse communities around the world as society, technology and knowledge change at a rapid pace.
The rights, obligations and dilemmas of being a citizen are examined in contemporary western, non-western, and non-state legal systems, drawing on Common law, civil, international, and indigenous law, as well as the social construction of legal authority, political authority, judicial activism, and principles of human rights.
Topics include:
- Democracy versus justice.
- The public good - rights of the individual versus the community.
- National security, human rights and justice.
- Law, religion, and the secular State.
- Offenders, victims and public order.
- Sex, drugs and decency.
- Media, influence and freedom to speak.
- Technology frontiers and human capacity.
- Social justice - privilege, disadvantage and opportunity under the law.
We deconstruct these ethical and institutional challenges in social regulation, and elucidate opportunities for legal change to achieve democracy, justice, and development - the foundations of human agency, freedom and wellbeing.
A big component of the unit is that you will be mentored in multidisciplinary teams to develop major socio-legal reform submissions on your chosen topics in social-political justice, to be presented and debated in public forum.
LEX102
Sustainability, Science and the Law
Today, right here and with us, the world faces a huge sustainability question:
If we want human rights, and community prosperity, and environmental justice ... should we place most importance on protecting the environment, growing the economy, demanding democratic freedom, seeking scientific certainty, arguing legal philosophy, promoting social fairness, defining ethical behaviour, upholding indigenous tradition, pursuing political practicality ... or all of these?
This unit critiques the multidisciplinary perspectives on humans and environment, and how legal innovation integrates them to enhance social ownership and political leadership towards a more sustained human and planetary future.
We examine science-law relationships, socio-political governance, environmental regulation, and social design and capacity building.
We consider a diversity of legislation, court cases, treaties, institutions, and community actors as sources of rights, obligations and influence which affect both environmental management directly and the progression of social regulation more generally towards a sustainable world.
We illustrate the issues and innovations in regulation for sustainability, with case studies from
- water law
- logging
- fisheries
- pollution
- climate change
- food security
- urbanisation
- whaling
- corporate sustainability
- and many others
Your learning culminates in a major project where you will be individually mentored to apply your acquired legal problem solving skills, stakeholder analysis, collaborative research, and creativity to develop law reform proposals on local and global sustainability topics.
LEX102 can be taken to satisfy the requirement for completion of a Planet unit under Macqarie's Bachelor Degree rules, and it can also be taken generally as an elective to complement your specific choice of units in your degree program.
No prerequisite knowledge of the law is required to do this unit, and there is an emphasis on analysis of issues from pluralistic perspectives and a constant discourse between students from widely varying academic disciplines.